Twin Cities Triathlon Race Report

Wow, what an improvement in just 4 weeks!  This weekend’s race, The Twin Cities Triathlon, was the inaugural event put on by Optum Performance at Harriet Island in Downtown St. Paul.  Let me start this off by saying it down poured the night before the race and I thought to myself “fantastic, it’s going to be cold and rainy in the morning, isn’t it?” See I don’t do well when it’s cold. And yes this means winter sucks here in Minnesota but when I talk about cold in the middle of summer, I am talking about 65 degrees!  I would rather be enveloped in a nice 80 degree, tropical blanket of a dewpoint of 70 all year round!



286 Baby! Shivering at the start, which was delayed.

But the rain was done by in the early morning hours and the sun rose with some cloud cover that eventually dissipated as the race went on.

That River Is Fast!

Swimming like a fish!

I did the sprint tri race which is a .3 mile swim/14 mile bike/3.1 mile run and usually these are held at lakes all across the world. What made this swim actually fun (I am furthest from a fish as you can get) was that we swam downstream in the Mississippi for the first leg.  My average time for this swim distance is around 8 minutes and here, in the river, I came in at 4 minutes, 43 seconds!  Now while this is technically a PR (personal record) it can’t really be used as such because in a lake I’ll never (well; maybe shouldn’t say never) touch this again!

Where The H*** Did These Hills Come From?!

Transition 1 (swim to bike) was faster than it has been before or in practice but there is room for improvement.  So we get on our bikes and head out onto the course. I had rode the course the week before so I knew what we all were up against but in a race setting it got a little tougher than I expected. Looking up the infamous (as I will put it) Ohio Street hill was like looking up Alpe d'huez! There was absolutely no relief throughout the course and finding some momentum was extremely difficult and challenging.  Now don’t get me wrong that was fun but it was no cake walk either! Up , down, false flats and then crazy descents and then all of a sudden a 10% grade ascent….pretty much the entire way.  But I survived the 14 mile course in 40 minutes, 29 seconds at an average speed of 20.4 mph.  What was insanely fun was cruising one of the descents at over 45 mph!  That was fun and a huge relief after all of the climbing on the course route.

Off of bike into transition 2, heading out for a run

More D*** Hills!

So I come racing into transition 2 and was determined to get out onto the run course as fast as I possibly could and I have to say it was an extremely fast transition. Fast enough(43 seconds from the time you get off your bike to the moment you hit the run course, including changing into running shoes, racking bike and taking off your helmet, etc) to make the top 10 overall for transition 2, out of 127 competitors. The run was challenging too as we were led unto the Wabasha Street bridge, which is a pretty decent incline leading into the heart of St. Paul, and then the course took a hard right down 2^nd street to Shepard Road.  It was challenging, fun and by this time the sun was out and it was a nice, beautiful Sunday morning to be a racing!  My time for the 5k run was slower than I thought it would be. I came in at 19 minutes, 40 seconds or 6:21/mile average. With all the hills in the bike and run courses I can’t be disappointed with this either.

Skyline view @ the finish!

Overall, it was great morning and a fantastic result for my 2^nd triathlon of this year & the first “season” of racing in nearly 15 years.  I want to thank those who got up at the crack a** of dawn to come see me race and cheer me on.  My parents and our neighbor and friend Andy with his two young daughters.  Who I later found out were playing triathlon in the backyard that afternoon! Awesome! Our friends Erin, Melissa and Dan and of course my lovely wife, Aubrey; whom without her support I couldn’t get back to racing and our daughter, Amelia!  Just a side note but worth writing; we have to hide the cowbell from her otherwise she keeps cheering us on….ALL DAY!

People came to cheer me on!

Oh yeah, stats. Total time: 1 hour, 6 minutes & 49 seconds.  I was 7^th overall (out of 127) and was on the podium with 3^rd place in my age group!  The top 3 in my age group (30-35) were all within 20 seconds of each other. I had shaved off a 2 minute advantage by 1^st place in the run…just needed another mile to win but alas, I ran out course to run! My run was the 3^rd fastest run split overall (out of 127) and as I said earlier, I had the 9^th fastest split in transition 2.

Podiums! Green shirt is me!

Well, time to stop writing and get out on the bike for a 150 minute ride. Those miles won’t do themselves!  I have a 4 week block of training here before the Maple Grove Olympic Triathlon is upon us, August 27^th at Weaver Lake Park. It is a huge event with (dare I say) 1000 competitors and a world ranked professional heat as well.  Chris “MACCA” McCormack, 2X Kona IronMan Champion and ITU World Champion, is going to be there racing. Oh I wish I was a spectator so I could see that mother race! Gonna be sweet!

 2011 Twin City Tri Race Results Page

Well, until later, thanks for checking in and keep staying active!

The reason I TRI, my wife, Aubrey and our daughter, Amelia!

So Here We Go!

So why create a blog and write posts? It wasn’t that long ago where I would have said “I DON’T JOURNAL!” but things change I suppose.  The main reason for this blog will be to chronicle my journey into triathlon and college and record what I’ve learned from myself and my experiences.  Some may not find that intriguing and that’s okay but I do hope that through this blog I can encourage others to get active, get healthier or just keep motivated to stay on the path you are on!

What it is not is a “Look at me and all the things I’m doing! Congratulate me and make me feel good!” That most certainly is not what I want this site to be about.  Naturally we all want and need assurance and motivation but I thought instead of tweeting or posting on Facebook every random thought; maybe it would be better to put some actually writings and thoughts on ‘paper’ and post them. So I hope that you read this blog and comment, respond and who knows maybe teach each other something about ourselves. Over the course of the next few weeks, I will be adding images and postings as well as notching up the design of the site too. So stay tuned, sign up to get updates when I post a new article and keep at it!

By the way, I have my second triathlon (in 15 years) coming up this Sunday, July 24^th at Harriet Island Park in St. Paul. My goal is top 10 overall. I don’t necessarily like these sprint tri’s as they are too fast. I’d rather get in there and hack it out for a couple of hours.  I’d rather stay quick over longer distances and be more analytical and have more strategy involved. What these short distance races, here at the beginning of my journey, will do is help me become accustom to racing and transitioning as well as give me the necessary confidence I need in order to increase distances and levels.

I will post my post-race thoughts on this race, course and how I did. Stay tuned and check it out when it’s up.  Thanks to all who took the time to read this first, introductory post and to whom ever signed up for email updates!